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to his face. Fred Bunker’s his rightful name, and he’s really not an Archie Bunker type, but he’s the kind of good gray bureaucrat that old field farts like me find it hard to take seriously.”
    Dan Nitzke’s description had been about the same. “Not much field experience, and for a guy in Covert Action he doesn’t seem to know anything about news media, but, God help you, he’s going to be head of your team.”
    That made no sense to Frank, but it seemed consistent with the rest of their assignment. None of it made much sense.
    “Let me break it down to you as best I can, the way I got it from Dan Nitzke and a couple of guys in Near East. The idea seemed to originate in the National Security Council. I’d have to guess Pete Howard had a hand in it.”
    “Your rabbi,” mumbled Gus.
    “People say so,” shrugged Frank. “I got the idea the Near East guys didn’t much like Pete, or me and other Covert Action types.”
    “A lot of people resent Pete,” said Gus, “because he’s so good at what he does. And maybe a tad arrogant about it. You can also figure the Near East guys don’t like having to handle an assignment from the National Security Council, which they see as a branch of the White House.”
    “What’s wrong with being a branch of the White House?” asked Frank.
    “You might be foolish enough to think State, the CIA, the National Security Council, the FBI, the White House, and so on were all on the same side. And the enemy is the Soviet Union and all its Eastern Europe satellites and Communist China. But that would be wrong. Our first and primary enemy is all those other bureaucracies we have to compete with for attention and budget. Plus, within the agency, you and I report to Dean Lomax, Covert Action, right?”
    “Right,” said Frank. “I guess.”
    “Covert Action has its own turf to protect, and the enemy at the gates is all the other divisions, Near East, Soviet, Eastern Europe, Africa, Far East, and on and on. Not to mention other shops like Counter Intelligence you don’t even want to know about. Competition in house is even worse ’cause it involves career advancement, promotions, pensions, paychecks, all that really important stuff. It’s only when we’re done kickin’ ass with all those other outfits that we can pay some attention to the Soviets.”
    “I’ve got a terrible feeling you’re right,” said Frank.
    “Yeah, I’m right about all that,” said Gus. “But I still don’t have much of an idea what the job is. And why the hell we got elected.”
    “Okay,” said Frank. “You know the Shah has a world of troubles on his hands. Protests. Shootings. Talk of torture. Demonstrations, not just here but Washington, New York, Paris, London. Just about any place that’s got Iranian students. The agency and, I guess, NSC believe the Russians pull the strings.”
    “What about this holy man?”
    “Khomeini, or whatever his name is?”
    Gus nodded.
    Frank had seen only a few brief references to the man identified as Ayatullah Khomaini by the Journal and Ayatollah Khomeini by the Washington Post . How important can he be, Frank wondered, if our leading papers aren’t sure how to spell his name?
    “I don’t know,” he said. “I get the feeling both State and Langley think the real problem is the Soviets.”
    “Sounds like World War III,” said Gus.
    “Maybe not quite.”
    “Yeah, it is.” Frank had barely touched his soup. Gus had finished his. “You may as well hear it now. My favorite after-dinner topic. Simpson’s theory of World War III. It’s all the border wars and mad bombers, all the tribal shootups and head bashings that go on all the time all over the world. That’s your World War III, my friend, and it doesn’t matter whether we or the Russkies get involved or not. Fact, unless we think, usually by mistake, that our own national interest is involved, we won’t get involved, and unless some worldwide television cameras stumble into it the rest